If you are still quite a young person, you may not even have retirement planning on your radar. After all, you still have many years of work ahead of you, and you might think that there is plenty of time before you have to consider what you will do in your retirement years. Actually, it is never too early to start planning for retirement, and following a few simple steps now can smooth out the process later on.
Set Goals
Your first step is to set some goals for yourself. You might think about the age at which you want to retire, where you want to live, whether you want to travel or pursue a new venture and how much you might need to support yourself after retirement. Your goals may certainly change throughout your life, but they will give you a starting point and help you determine realistic savings plans and investment options.
Explore Your Options
Next, you should explore your options for savings and investment. Learn about Individual Retirement Accounts (IRAs), and pay close attention to the various types available and the tax regulations and restrictions associated with each. Research stocks and bonds, CDs and savings accounts. You can read the basics online or delve a little deeper with books by authors like Robert Ryerson of Freehold, NJ. You might also want to meet with a financial counselor or retirement planning specialist to receive personalized advice for your present circumstances and future goals.
Talk to Your Employer
When you accepted your current job, you may not have been thinking about retirement benefits, but you should look into them now. Find out if your employer offers a 401(k) and, if so, how to sign up for it. A 401(k) will allow you to save money that your employer will match up to a certain percent. Also learn about your company’s pension plan options, if any. These details will figure into your retirement planning.
Learn about Social Security
You should also make an effort to better understand the Social Security system. Read about Social Security and how it works, and learn about the kinds of benefits you might expect at retirement. You can log in to your personal Social Security account, too, and see a record of how much you have already paid in as well as an estimate of how much you might receive in benefits when you retire.
Start Saving
Most important of all, you must start saving for retirement right now. Begin by putting aside a small amount of money from each paycheck. It does not have to be much, but earmark it for savings, put it into an interest-bearing account or solid investment and leave it there. This savings should be above and beyond what you put into your 401(k) if you have one. If you can, increase your savings deposit periodically. You might have to make some cuts to do this. Cancel a subscription service or two, or scale back on how many times you eat out. Your savings will grow.
Planning for retirement is a long process accomplished over many years, but the sooner you start, the more confident you can be about your future.